Penfield's Greatest Swimmer

🌊~15

The splintering sound of wood echoed through the speakers as the bad guy crashed into a nearby bookshelf.

"Ooo, that's gonna hurt," Deon commented before shoving a handful of popcorn in his mouth.

It was a Saturday night and right after our gaming session, Akunna and Deon decided to have a movie night.

So here I was perched up on my bed, watching Dwayne Johnson towering over the bad guy on Akunna's laptop, which had been placed on a small table in the middle of the room with Deon's speakers attached to it.

Akunna suddenly jumped off his bed, as if he'd just remembered something and quickly moved to the fridge where a tube of pills sat. He grabbed it and a bottle of water before coming back to his bed.

My curiosity heightened. Ever since I joined him in here, I'd seen Akunna take those pills every day. It was as if he couldn't live without them, and that was what pushed me to ask, "Hey, what are those for?"

Akunna stiffened then turned his back to me. "It's none of your business."

The snarky reply not only surprised me, but caught Deon's attention too. "Really, Akunna?"

He wouldn't even cast a look behind. "Not everyone needs to know."

"He's your roommate," Deon interjected. "If there's anyone who needs to know its him, cuz he's the first person that will come to your aid if something bad happens."

Akunna still wouldn't look back, taking his sweet time tossing a pill into his mouth then gulped down some water. His shoulders slouched forward, contemplating. After a while, he seemed to have grasped the sense in Deon's words because he sat up and finally turned over to us. "Ok fine, I'll tell you." His eyes flickered to me, brimming with so much reluctance that I was about to tell him not to, when he simply said, "I have type two diabetes."

I stared at him. "What?"

"I have diabetes." He lifted the orange tube. "And these pills help keep my blood sugar in check. That's why I take them every day." There was a brief pause. "So... that's it. Now you know."

I scooched closer to the edge of the bed, remorse building up inside me. "Akunna, I'm so s-"

"No, no, don't." Plastering his hands to his ears, my roommate shook his head. "This is exactly why I didn't want to tell you. I don't want you pitying me because I'm sick. I get enough of that from my parents."

"I'm not pitying you."

"Then what's the 'I'm sorry' for, huh?" Akunna's tone rose as he took his hands off his ears. "I'm tired of hearing those words. Anyone finds out that I'm sick, then they start treating me as if I'm fragile, like I'm going to die any moment from now...and I don't want that." He sucked in a breath. "I'm just eighteen. I wanna live my life to the fullest."

The room fell eerily quiet. Deon had paused the movie and was now observing Akunna. "I had no idea you felt that way," he mumbled.

"Yeah well...you can't expect me to talk freely about this." Akunna became silent, biting his lower lip. "But you guys can't let this change stuff between us, ok. I don't want any of you babying me or criticizing what I eat because I'm sick. One good thing about being here is that I get to eat what I want, unlike back at home where I have to tolerate my mum's insipid meal plan."

"Oh c'mon on, I'm sure it's not that bad." Deon leaned against the chair behind him. "All mums are great cooks."

"Well my mum isn't," Akunna scoffed. "If I had to survive on just her cooking, I'd probably be a corpse by now."

Deon laughed, "If she ever heard you say that..."

Their chatter faded into the distance as a soft whistle from my phone stole my attention. I rolled over to where it sat, charging. Pulling the device out, notifications for a few WhatsApp messages greeted me and when I opened the app, the first on the list was a message from Princess.